Subscribe to the channel at http://bit.ly/eisenbahnromantik Official homepage: http://www.swr.de/eisenbahnromantik/ Railways in the Baltic States and the legacy of the Soviet Union In the old railway era, which was anything but good from the perspective of the Balts, everything worked centrally: orders came from Moscow - and far away from Moscow, the Baltic railways had to ensure that goods from the huge Soviet Union were transported to the ice-free Baltic ports. Things are not very different today. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania founded their own railway companies to handle the transfer of goods from the CIS states. Much still needs to be done, the Ventspils-Riga-Daugavpils railway line is still a trip back to a bygone century. In the south-east of Latvia, on the border with Russia, a TEP 60, a 2,208 kilowatt Russian tractor, pulls the express train to Saint Petersburg. With 12,000 diesel locomotives of the type 2TE10 with two 2,208 kilowatts from the Ukraine, the TE 10 was the most important freight train locomotive in Soviet times. To this day, it is in service on the broad-gauge connections between Latvia and Russia. In the railway depot in Jelgava, the TE10 and its thundering colleagues of the type 2M62 are prepared for freight traffic. While the warhorse of the Latvian shunting operation, the six-axle Czech ME 4, positions the tractors for the next freight train, Toms Altbergs, curator of the Railway Museum in Riga, shows treasures: They are being looked after here in the depot in Jelgava until a place can be found for them in the museum itself. Two L 2-10-0s, built in 1955 in Luhansk in the Ukraine and until recently still in use for special tourist trips. Weighing 92 tons and almost 24 meters long with a tender, the Lebedyanka, named after its designer, was the most important broad-gauge steam locomotive in the USSR after the Second World War. The two steam giants are not the only gems in Jelgava. In the shed next to it is a Class 52 war locomotive. One of over six thousand that the German Wehrmacht used to transport its supplies to the Eastern Front. Long after the end of the war, the robust and low-maintenance tender locomotives were in use all over Eastern Europe. One of the first, with the serial number 52 021 from 1942, is waiting in Jelgava to be renovated for Riga. The port of Ventspils on the Baltic Sea. Its greatest asset is its location, as it is ice-free all year round. This means that raw materials from Russia can be delivered to ships and thus to the world market using the broad-gauge railway for twelve months. Almost 30 million tons were shipped here last year. A museum railway also steams through the Baltic dunes with a former brigade locomotive as the traction engine. The railway and the associated railway museum in Viesite report record numbers of visitors almost every year, and everywhere the remains of the old army field railways are spruced up for visitors. Such as the MI 635, manufactured by Schwartzkopff in 1918. Riga main station, a 2M62 arrives, the even louder version of heavy Russian freight train locomotives. The diesel locomotive with over 2 x 1,400 kilowatts is called the Taiga drum. The Taiga drum will not stay in Riga for long. The station is primarily reserved for passenger traffic. Electric trains similar to the S-Bahn serve the suburbs. Otherwise, there are passenger trains from Riga to Belarus and of course to Russia. Showpieces in the Riga Railway Museum, one of the largest and most beautiful in the Baltic States: TEP 60 Here you can also find the magnificently renovated sister of the class 52 steam locomotive that is rusting away in Jelgava. The Latvian railway network covered a total of over 3,300 kilometers, mainly in the Russian broad gauge of 1,524 millimeters, south of Daugavpils also partly in the European standard gauge of 1,435 mm. At all times, the transport business between the Latvian Baltic ports to the Russian raw material regions was much more important than passenger transport. In Zilupe, the border station on the Latvian side, a 2TE 116 arrives from Russia, weighing 128 tons, with two 2250 kilowatts of power, the most successful Soviet freight locomotive used for heavy freight trains to date. Anyone who witnesses the trains being dispatched can hardly believe how quickly the Iron Curtain, the gate to the Soviet Union, the border fences and the travel restrictions have dissolved into nothing - almost nothing.